The Wedding Journey

by Cheryl St. John

  He rarely let himself think about Jonathon or his failure to save him, but the memories of all he’d lost stalked him in the night, haunting his dreams and stealing any peace he hoped to find.

  The risks to a newborn on this ship terrified him. And the dilemma of caring for a baby posed a problem, as well. Perhaps, if no mother was found, they could find a family to take in the infant for the duration of the journey.

  He approached Maeve and Nora. “Boil everything that touches this baby,” he told them. “Boil the cups in which we carry the milk.” He glanced at the tubing. “You’re using that to feed her? Did you boil it? Good. Wash your hands thoroughly.” He handed Maeve the half-full cup. “Throw out any she doesn’t take and get fresh each feeding. I’ll notify the captain that she’s been found. A search to turn up her mother will come next, I have no doubt. Shall we find someone to care for her?”

  Nora appeared stricken at the idea. “I can take care of her!”

  “Nora, what about your kitchen duties?” Maeve asked.

  “You and Bridget can help. We’ll share her care and feeding.” She gave her younger sister a pleading glance. “Please. She’s so tiny and alone. We know she’ll be safe with us—and under the doctor’s supervision. With someone else we can’t be sure they’ll care for her properly or give her the attention she needs.”

  Maeve looked at the fragile little human being in Nora’s arms, now frantically sucking at the pinpricks they’d made in the tubing and swallowing in noisy gulps. “I have helped care for a good many newborns. ’Tis not such a hardship.”

  She glanced at Flynn, and her compassionate blue gaze shot him through, touching a tiny crevice in his hardened heart. Thoroughly impractical though it may be to have an infant strapped to his assistant or a kitchen worker, the warm burst of admiration he felt at their earnest concern and willingness to take on this task couldn’t be denied.

  He didn’t let himself look at the baby, but the sound of her sucking speared his heart. He gave Nora a stern look. “Clear your intent with Mr. Mathers. Assure me you have his approval and promise you’ll take no safety risks in the galley. If you’re to be near fire or water, you will give your turn over to one of your sisters.”

  “Yes, of course,” Nora acknowledged quickly. “Thank you, Dr. Gallagher. God bless you.”

  “I’m going to assign one of the McCorkle boys to run errands for you part of the day. Emmett is the youngest and most agile, so he will run for milk and carry messages between the three of you.” He looked at Maeve. “Thoroughly instruct him on sanitation.”

  She nodded her understanding. “Certainly, doctor. I’m relatively sure he already comprehends hand washing. Sean filled me in on their lesson. It made quite an impression.”

  Flynn asked Nora to place the baby on the examining table once she’d burped. “Let’s have a listen now.” He glanced up and then away. “The two of you may call me Flynn when there are no patients or other passengers present.”

  Maeve gave him one of her stunning smiles. “Thank you, Flynn.”

  A soot-faced cabin boy appeared then, extending a piece of paper. Flynn took it and read the hastily scrawled note. Seemed the captain had invited him to dinner in his cabin that evening. “Tell Captain Conley I’d be happy to join him and his wife.”

  The lad nodded and hurried off.

  Once Flynn had listened to the baby’s heart and lungs, he left Nora to diaper and dress her as best she could.

  “Are we going to try to find the baby’s mother?” Maeve asked in a near whisper.

  He gestured for her to follow him into the smaller room. “One of us can go to the captain while the other stays here.”

  “I’ll go,” she offered.

  He nodded his approval.

  Maeve told Nora what she was doing and left to find the captain in the chart house. “May I have a moment to speak with you?” she asked.

  Once she’d explained the situation, he removed his cap and scratched his head. “Never had this happen b’fore. Plenty o’ babies been born aboard, but none have been deserted.”

  “I was thinking you could go over the ship’s manifest,” Maeve suggested. “See how many women of childbearing age are aboard and then question them.”

  “Sounds like a logical plan. Come with me.”

  She joined him in his cabin, where Mrs. Conley was cheerfully humming and scrubbing potatoes. Their cabin had a tiny kitchen area with hanging pots and pans that swayed with the ship’s movement.

  The captain set the heavy manifest on the scarred table with a thump and opened to the last pages.

  After hearing Maeve’s story, Martha Conley joined their efforts. She got a paper, pen and ink to make a list, then pushed them toward Maeve. “Your writin’s probably better’n mine, dearie.”

  They came up with thirty-nine possibilities for someone who might have given birth.

  Martha took a knife from a crock and slit the paper in half, handing half to Maeve. “We’ll each take half. Do you think you can talk to nineteen women today?”

  Maeve nodded. “I’ll do as many as I can this morning and the rest after I’m finished in the dispensary.”

  “We’ll compare this evening, then,” Martha said.

  * * *

  After visiting with fifteen women, Maeve determined all of them unlikely to have given birth to a baby and abandoned it. Five were pregnant and three had new babies. The rest were widows. With four remaining on her list. Maeve went about her duties. She didn’t hold much remaining hope for finding the baby’s mother.

  At noon she carried a meal to Sean, who had been moved to the doctor’s quarters and made comfortable. She looked about the physician’s neat room, noting rolled pallets where the three McCorkle brothers had slept. Books lined specially made shelves with brass bars to hold the volumes in place, and more were stacked here and there, where Flynn had left them. The doctor had a private cabin, with more space than she and twelve others shared each night.

  She pictured him here, poring over his books. It was curious that a man of his age, especially one so handsome and intelligent, didn’t seem to be married. But he must be single. If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have taken a position like this.

  Sean was glad for company, so she stayed while he ate his potato soup. “Dr. Gallagher said in America boys like me learn numbers and words. He said he’ll help find us a family to stay with, where we can do chores an’ go to school.”

  He talked her ear off before she could get away. Half of his sentences started with Dr. Gallagher.

  Upon returning to the dispensary, she gathered containers and went to the foredeck to boil more water. While it cooled, she absorbed the warmth of the glorious sun and gazed across the vast Atlantic. The water’s surface was crowded with slimy-looking objects of varying size, form and color, some of them resembling a lemon cut in half. In the distance two ships on the horizon kept the Annie McGee company. Were those ships as laden with immigrants escaping lives of poverty as this one?

  Nearby, male passengers in three-piece suits and ladies in finely made dresses strolled the deck or sat upon wooden folding chairs. The women held parasols over their heads to protect their skin from the sun, reminding Maeve that she’d been standing there too long. She covered the pots of water and carried them back to the dispensary.

  “It’s a beautiful, sunny day.”

  Dr. Gallagher had been seated at his small writing desk making notes since she’d left. He didn’t look up.

  “Did you stop for a meal?” she asked.

  “Lost track of time,” he replied distractedly.

  A commotion sounded in the corridor, and the door burst open. A woman’s screams raised the hair on Maeve’s neck. A sailor leaned in and spotted her. “The doctor in?”

  “He’s right here. Is someone sick?”

  “We got her right here.” He backed into the room, carrying one end of a blanket, upon which a woman lay, writhing in pain.

  Flynn shot up and ran to meet them as the
second man, a passenger dressed in plain clothing, entered with the other end of the blanket.

  The reason for the woman’s distress was immediately obvious. Her skirts were blackened, with much of the fabric burned away, right down to her pantaloons. The sickening smell of scorched wool reached Maeve.

  Chapter Seven

  Maeve swallowed and took a deep breath to stay calm.

  “Caught her skirts on a cook fire, she did,” the passenger said.

  “Are you family?” Flynn asked.

  “Aye, she’s m’wife,” he replied.

  Maeve had treated burns before, and she knew how much pain the woman suffered. “Laudanum?” she asked automatically.

  “Chloroform first,” Flynn answered. “Bring her over here to the table,” he instructed.

  Maeve doused a square of gauze. “What’s her name?” she asked the husband.

  “Goldie,” he replied in a thick voice. “Goldie McHugh.” He cleared his throat, but didn’t tear his stricken gaze from his wife.

  “The doctor’s going to take good care of you, Goldie.” Maeve smoothed the woman’s hair at the same time she placed the gauze over her nose and mouth. “Just take a few deeps breaths now. You’ll sleep.”

  The woman’s eyes, filled with pain and fear, met Maeve’s in those torturous few moments before her lids drifted closed and she lay blessedly still.

  “Now prepare a dose of laudanum,” Flynn instructed. He turned to the husband. “Miss Murphy and I are going to have to cut the remainder of her skirts away to see how severe her injuries are. I understand your concern for your wife, sir, but the fewer people in here while we treat her, the better her chances.”

  “I’m not leavin’ my Goldie like this,” the man argued.

  “Understand now, she is at risk for serious infection, and until we can see how badly she’s burned, your presence places her in jeopardy.”

  His words were severe, but Maeve comprehended his concern to keep the room and the wounds as clean as possible.

  Goldie’s husband seemed taken aback by that information and stood with his mouth clamped shut.

  “Every second I spend with you is a second I’m not attending to your wife,” Flynn added.

  Maeve watched their interaction with deep compassion for the man and appreciation for the physician’s wisdom.

  At last a look of resignation crossed the big man’s face. “I’ll be in the corridor.”

  As soon as the door had closed, Flynn was all business, cutting away the remaining skirts as close to the burned area as possible. Maeve removed the woman’s shoes and cut the remaining portions of Goldie’s wool stockings away. Maeve assisted him as he used a large pair of tweezers and removed bits of fabric seared to the lower portions of Goldie’s legs.

  Each time flesh was revealed, Maeve marveled that there was skin intact beneath the scorched fabric.

  “I don’t want to peel away skin, but I can’t leave this fabric stuck to the burns,” he said as though thinking aloud.

  Maeve studied the patches. “We could soak rags in vinegar and lie them over the wounds to keep it all wet while you work.”

  “That’s a sound idea.” He gathered rags and a basin of vinegar and plunged the fabric down in the liquid.

  “I honestly expected to see much worse,” Maeve confessed.

  “As did I. She’s extremely fortunate. Seems whoever doused the flames did so quickly enough to spare her.” He draped the wet rags over her shins. “How would you have treated this patient back home?”

  “With whatever was available. Potato peels work well. I once made a liniment of turpentine and yellow basilion. But I most appreciate the properties of cotton ash paste.”

  “That’s my first choice, as well. How did you make yours?”

  “Burned cotton wool and mixed it with any oil available. Usually linseed or olive.”

  “Cotton wool ashes are in the big jar in the base of that cabinet.” He gestured with a nod as he lifted the corner of the rag and loosened a bit of fabric from their patient’s leg. “This is coming right off. Go ahead and mix the ashes with peppermint oil to make a paste.”

  She did as directed, stirring the blackened concoction that smelled better than it looked. She placed the container and a wooden spatula at the ready.

  To their amazement, once Flynn was finished removing fabric, there were only half a dozen small patches of seriously burned skin and a few blisters. Goldie would definitely be in pain, but she would heal.

  Flynn took the container and carefully smeared black paste on the woman’s shins. “We want to keep this dressing fresh and the skin completely covered for a few days.”

  Maeve nodded.

  “How did you learn all you know about methods of healing?” he asked. Her instincts were impressive.

  “My mother had a good many home remedies,” she answered. “I was always interested in her methods, and she was eager to teach.” The stick he used became too glommed with paste, so she handed him a clean one.

  “I have always found it fascinating how our ancestors used home remedies—roots, flowers, herbs—with excellent healing properties,” Flynn commented. “I have often wondered about the first people who tried such a remedy. Where did they get their ideas?”

  Maeve shook her head in reply. “There was an elderly woman in our village who tended the sick for many years, until she grew too old and feeble. It was then her nephew and his family took her in. She sat in a chair just outside their front door the last years of her life. Sharp as a tack, she was. Anything I needed to know, I went to her. Plus, much of my education came by accident and necessity.”

  “You have a natural instinct,” he told her. “I saw physicians graduating with less skill than you. What is it you plan to do when you get to America?”

  “Have you heard of a place called Faith Glen?”

  “Indeed. It’s not far from Boston.”

  “Is it pretty there?”

  He glanced at her and then back down at his work. “It’s on the coast, so the countryside is green and lush. A welcoming little village, much like those in Ireland. Without the lava beneath or the eroded cliffs, of course.”

  “I can see it now,” she breathed.

  “How did you learn of Faith Glen?”

  “After my father’s death, my sisters and I found a letter written to my mother many years ago. In it, the writer explained he had bought her a cottage in Faith Glen. We had nowhere to go, because the land we farmed had been given to the landlord’s family…so we decided to set about learning if this deed is legal and if the house is still there. Have you ever heard of a man named Laird O’Malley?”

  He finished the task and draped clean cloth over Goldie’s legs. “Can’t say I have, no. Is he family?”

  “We’re not sure who he is—or was. But he thought enough of our mother to buy a house and deed it to her.” After checking that Goldie still slept soundly, she cleaned up supplies and put away containers. “We’ve left behind everything we ever knew on the chance that there’s a new beginning for us in that village. We spent all we had on fare and food to last this journey. Working on the ship will give us a little money to live off, but once we reach our destination, we’ll need jobs.”

  Flynn covered Goldie with a crisp clean sheet. “No doubt the wondering is a burden to the three of you. Will you find this house? Does this O’Malley fellow exist?”

  His perception warmed her even more to the man. “We’ve had to turn the worry over to the good Lord,” she told him. “He tells us not to be afraid, because He is with us and takes care of us no matter what. I believe that.”

  The doctor rolled the scraps of burned fabric and Goldie’s ruined skirts into a compact ball. “I’ll burn these on deck later.”

  “I can do it.”

  He listened to Goldie’s heart and tested her pulse before looking up at Maeve. “She’s doing well. I want to keep her dosed and unconscious for the rest of the day.”

  “It will be the kindest
thing to do.”

  “And it will prevent movement and dislodging of the dressings.”

  “I will stay with her.”

  “Maeve,” he said, “if the house in Faith Glen isn’t there or is occupied—if you can’t find this O’Malley fellow or anyone to recognize the deed, I’ll make certain you find quarters in a good boardinghouse. You and your sisters won’t be left with nowhere to go. I give you my word.”

  Maeve’s eyes filled with tears she rapidly blinked away. “Thank you. My sisters will be as relieved as I am to hear that.” She chanced a direct look at his face. “You’re a kind and generous man, Flynn.”

  He dropped his gaze to the patient. “I’d like to think someone would do the same for my sisters.”

  “You have sisters?”

  “Two of them. Spoiled and pampered. One is getting married next month.”

  “Where is your family?”

  “Galway,” he replied. “That’s where I lived before…”

  “Before?”

  “Before I researched and traveled. I’ll be talking to Goldie’s husband now. I’m grateful I have good news for him.”

  He strode to the door and ushered the man inside.

  The entire time he spoke with the man about his wife’s injury and fortunate circumstance, Maeve counted her blessings. Their future was still uncertain as far as the house in Faith Glen went, but at least Flynn’s assurance they wouldn’t be on the streets set her mind at ease. She couldn’t wait to tell Nora and Bridget, but first she had another four women to locate.

  * * *

  His capable—and undeniably beautiful—assistant had generously offered to check on Goldie that evening while Flynn enjoyed a leisurely supper in Captain Conley’s cabin.

  Flynn had sailed the Annie McGee on several occasions and had previously sampled a delicious and hearty lobscouse, unsurpassed by any other stew he’d ever tasted, prepared by the captain’s missus. This one was tender lamb with chunks of potato and turnip. Her biscuits were gold and flaky, and he was grateful to Maeve for the opportunity to enjoy this meal without having any fear for his patients’ well-being.